


Settle Out And Fade Away

by geckoholic



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Mentions of Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-27
Updated: 2012-11-27
Packaged: 2017-11-19 17:11:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/575654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/geckoholic/pseuds/geckoholic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The more things change, the more they stay the same and Sam isn't entirely sure which he prefers when a case pulls him and Dean to Providence, Rhode Island where something kills bereaved family members and he finds that certain things aren't buried as deep as he thought. Set in current canon (between 8.03 and 8.04).</p>
            </blockquote>





	Settle Out And Fade Away

**Author's Note:**

> Based on an art prompt made by gnatkip; her spectacular artwork can be found [HERE](http://gnatkip.dreamwidth.org/89598.html).
> 
> Beta'd by grasshopr_molly, yohkobennington, redbells, and partially nwspaprtaxis. She also lent me a hand when it came to pic the area to set the fic in, sniffed out towns and places that might fit the story, and came up with the summary. All remaining mistakes are mine. 
> 
> Title is from "The Travelers, Part 1" by Stone Sour.

The sight of the photo on her nightstand, first thing in the morning, punches the breath out of her lungs all over again every day. But Karen can't bring herself to turn it over or put it away. It's too much like admitting he's really gone, and she can't do that. Not yet. It's been more than six months and everyone keeps telling her to move on, get over it, start living again. If not for herself, then at least for Janie. 

But they don't know shit. Not about how she feels, not about what life is like now for her and her daughter, just the two of them. 

Janie's downstairs, puttering around in the kitchen. Karen can her hear, taking out a cereal bowl out of the cupboard – got to be that, Janie has hardly eaten anything else for breakfast since she was about ten – and opening the fridge. She figures, hey, if she's already awake, she might as well go downstairs and join her. 

The radio gets turned on while Karen gets out of bed and wraps her bathrobe around herself. Janie and her taste in music – modern pop music, like Taylor Swift or Carly Rae Jepsen – have slowly taken over all the radios and CD players in the house, but Karen doesn't mind. At least those songs don't carry any connections that remind her of Ray. 

She brushes her teeth, doesn't bother to brush her hair or put on make-up just yet, walks downs the stairs barefoot and still in her pajamas and the gown. “Hey, baby,” she calls out to Janie, “got some coffee going already, too?” 

Yawning, Karen scuffs into the kitchen – and jumps back a step when a searing pain cuts into the pad of her foot. She looks down, and it takes a few seconds for the sight to register: a bowl is in pieces on the floor, along with spilled milk and sodden cereal. Janie lies in the middle of it all, limp, blood all over her arms and hands. 

Just like Ray. 

It happened again. How did she even... Had she been sitting over her breakfast and suddenly decided to end it all, just where she was, taking a page out of her father's book? Joyce told her last week that it might be genetic, the propensity for suicide, and Karen missed the signs _again_. She lost her husband and now her daughter because she couldn't pay attention. 

She falls to her knees, doesn't care that the shards of the bowl cut into her flesh there as well, driven by the irrational need to clean up this mess. It's the only thing she can do. Janie's body is lifeless, pale, eyes blank and dead. She's not breathing anymore, this must have happened so fast – 

A hand on her shoulder tears her out of her stupor. “Mom? Mom, what's wrong? Are you okay?” 

“Janie?” Karen blinks. She looks up, stunned and confused. “I thought… Oh my god. I saw you… you were...” She rises to her feet in a flash, wraps her daughter up in her arms for a quick hug, before she looks around the kitchen once more. The bowl sits on the table – two of them actually – whole and empty, the milk and the box of cereals next to it. Janie must've heard her upstairs and decided to wait for her to come down and join her. 

“Mom, you're worrying me. Is everything alright?” 

“Yeah,” Karen says and conjures up a strained smile. “I'm fine. I just thought... Never mind. Let's have breakfast, hm?” 

Outside, in the yard behind the kitchen, a vulture lands on the grass. It cranes its head towards the window, and is quickly joined by two others. They look foreign, not like the kind Karen's used to around here. 

She draws the curtains closed. 

 

 

*******

 

 

Sam should've known. Of course it wouldn't be just that one case before they went back to searching for Kevin and his mother full-time; they did check out a few new leads, and Sam spent some time online to see if he can trace them, but the kid learned his lesson. There's no paper trail left, and now they're back on their good old case-of-the-week routine. 

Well, maybe Sam did know this would happen. And maybe he ought to put his foot down, show Dean he means it: he's going to get out and this is not going to be his life again. Whatever. He's in no mood to fight with Dean; not this Dean, who's so homed in on the hunt that he doesn't seem to see anything else and casts Sam's wishes aside like the stupid ideas of a daydreaming child. 

After they checked out of their motel in Boulder, Colorado – the former home of a Mayan gone top-athlete – they set out north for a while, until Dean steers them off the freeway for a late lunch. They stop at a chain restaurant for a lack of better alternatives, and Sam excuses himself to the bathroom. When he's back, Dean's found them a table, and he's reading one of the shadier newspapers that he frequently consults in search of a new gig. Sam doesn't bother to check the name of the tab when Dean shoves it at him. 

“Read the article on page four. I'm gonna go get us some grub,” Dean says as he gets up. He heads off to line up in front of the counter. 

With a sigh and a head shake, Sam settles on the chair opposite the one Dean just abandoned, and reads. The article doesn't say much, but Dean's right. There's something off about this case; their kind of off. _Tragedy in Providence: Mother dies of heart attack the same day her teenager is abducted_ doesn't scream “creature” all on its own, but the article comes with pictures, and the strange patterns and scribbles visible on her wrists and neck point towards an unnatural cause of death. 

He folds the paper, puts it away. They'll need to see the body, or at least the photos in the coroner's report, to find out more about that. Squinting at a grainy, low-quality snapshot in the newspaper won't get him anywhere. 

A couple of minutes pass before Dean walks back over to their table, balancing a plate with premade sandwiches and chicken wings in one hand and two cups of coffee in the other. He unloads it all onto the table and sits down. “So, what do you think? Sound like a gig?” 

“Yeah. Worth checking out, at least.” 

Dean fishes his chicken wings from the plate, rips open a small packet of ketchup. “So you're up for this one? No objections?” 

“The daughter's still out there,” Sam picks up one of his sandwiches, holds it up without taking a bite yet. “Maybe we can help find her.”

“Good,” says Dean and points at Sam with a chicken wing. “We might make a hunter outta you again after all.”

 

***

 

It's more than a day's drive from Colorado to Rhode Island, requires a stop for the night, and by the time they arrived in Providence, gotten a room and dressed up for their FBI routine, the girl isn't missing anymore. She's dead, found in the woods several miles out of town, on the Massachusetts state line. 

The detective on the case eyes them warily when they introduce themselves – fucking suspicious city cops, small town sheriffs are easier to con – but after a moment's consideration, he shrugs his shoulders and holds the file out to Sam. “Knock yourselves out, I got enough cases on my desk that the feds aren't grabbing for. We interviewed the neighbors already, but they’re a chatty bunch, I'm sure they don't mind you two sticking your nose in as well.” 

Sam gives the file a cursory glance while Dean asks, “The neighbors? No family? What about the girl's father?” 

“He killed himself six months ago. No wonder the poor woman's heart gave out, I guess there's only so much tragedy one person can take.” The detective’s face turns thoughtful for a moment, before he gets back to business. “Anyway, the autopsy reports are in the file. Heart attack is the confirmed cause of death for the mom. The girl, though, that was nasty. She'd been tortured for days.” 

They thank him for his cooperation and leave the station. Dean leads the way, and Sam follows him absentmindedly while still rummaging around in the file. “Do you think the dad's suicide is related?” 

Dean doesn't turn, but Sam can read the shrug from the way his shoulders move. “It's possible. We should look into that as well, see if there's anything fishy about his death.” 

“I'll email the detective later, ask him if they have anything useful on record about that,” Sam says. He gets a noncommittal grunt in return from Dean, which he interprets as the end of that conversation. On the drive back to the motel, Sam turns the detective's words over in his head, and he's got to suppress a bitter laugh. _Only so much tragedy a person can take._ Yeah, well. He and Dean are both living proof that even if there's any truth to it, the bar lies much higher than the loss of your whole family. 

Sam glances over to Dean. His brother's wearing the sturdy expression that's been his new default since Purgatory; focused, somehow indifferent, and utterly unreadable to Sam. Dean's always worn masks, but for the first time in years Sam has no handle on how to look past them. Whether that's because Dean's closed himself up further than ever before or because Sam simply unlearned how to read his tells, he's not sure. 

 

***

 

The detective emails Sam back about the suicide later that evening, with the file as an attachment. It's pretty standard; the guy blew his brains out in the garage, gunshot residue on his hands and the suicide note looked legit. Karen was at the other end of town for a festival at Janie's school all afternoon with plenty of people to confirm her alibi. There's a coroner's report and a few interviews, but the case got closed up pretty quickly. No hints that it might be related to what happened with mother and daughter. 

They spend the evening with pictures of the patterns found on Karen's body. The high-resolution photos from the file are much easier to work with, and it doesn't take them long to identify the scribbles as a language: Arabic. Google comes up with several translation websites, and some scanning and copy-and-pasting later; Sam has a rough idea of the text. 

“I think I've got it,” he says and waves Dean over – who'd been immersed in the report from the place where Janie's body was found – to have a look. 

Dean gets up, walks over, and leans down to peek at the laptop screen over Sam's shoulder. The translation is only partial; some of the words aren't clear enough to get the site recognize them. 

Sam points at the parts of the text that the translator did work out. “This bit might help us the most. It's about the victim's soul. Something or someone's laid claim to it.” 

“Laid claim? Like a demon?” 

“Could be? The wording is a bit vague and it doesn't help that we have only half the translation.”

Dean moves behind him, unbends, but doesn't walk away yet. “Brown's not far from here, right? Maybe we'll find a professor who can translate it all.”

“Worth a try, yeah.” 

“So, we'll do that first thing tomorrow morning. After we’ll re-interview the neighbors,” Dean announces, like a sergeant handing out orders to his officers, but Sam's too tired to protest the commanding tone. It's not worth having a fight over. 

He stays at the computer, aimlessly clicking around, until Dean's soft snores deliver proof that he's fallen asleep over the file. Sam walks over, disentangles the photos and reports from his brother and puts them away before he goes to bed himself. 

 

***

 

Their first trip to the university is a waste of time. There are, indeed, a number of courses for Arabic but the professor in charge is the definition of unhelpful. He keeps them waiting for almost an hour, and after half of it Dean gets up to pace through the room. The secretary – whose desk is in the same room as the waiting area – asks him to sit down and remain quiet twice. Dean grudgingly obeys, but he gets back up again not five minutes later each time. What follows is a loud discussion about the proper treatment of law enforcement officers that Sam grinds his teeth through, and when the professor finally calls them in Dean's a powder keg one shove short of an explosion. 

Unsurprisingly, Dean’s attitude doesn't do them any favors. 

“We're here about a translation, for a case –“, Dean starts, but the professor interrupts him. 

“Yes, I couldn't help but overhear that,” he says, posture and tone the perfect picture of a condescending academic. “Far be it from me to deny the law my assistance, but I have classes to teach, courses to prepare, and my schedule is quite busy at the moment. Leave the details with my secretary, and I'll get back to you as soon as at all possible.” 

Dean leans forward in his chair, ready to launch into an argument, but Sam puts a hand to his forearm and squeezes before he can say anything. “Thank you. We appreciate that.” 

The professor’s lips curl in a self-satisfied smile and, honestly, Sam can't hold it against him. He herds Dean out of the office and past the secretary's desk before he turns back to hand her a DVD burned with scans of the scribbles on Karen's body. 

Sam fully intends to call Dean on his outburst as soon as they're out of earshot, but by the time they're out of the building and on their way to the Impala, Dean's simmered down. He turns to Sam while he starts the ignition, calls the professor an “arrogant shithead” but there's no real venom in it. 

“You've been an ass to his secretary, of course he didn't fall over himself to help us,” Sam argues. 

Dean scowls. “Because they kept us waiting for-fucking-ever.” 

There's a whole other argument lurking underneath that, about how short-fused and trigger-happy Dean is since he came back, but Sam finds he's not interested in having it right now. “Whatever. Karen's neighbors next?” 

 

***

 

Most of the neighbors are cooperative and forthcoming and all, but the information they can give is irrelevant. There's chatter about how nice the family was and how tragic it all is, but nothing of substance. 

The only one who makes their tour around the neighborhood worth is a woman called Joyce. She's at least ten years older than Karen was, widowed as well, and the only one who doesn't revel in the attention and the opportunity to say nice things about their late neighbors. With a sad smile, she beckons them in – away from prying eyes and straining ears, she says – and offers them a seat on her couch. 

“Karen and I weren't all that close, not until Ray died at least. Shared experience and all, I guess. But after that, we became friends.” Her expression is absent; she's staring out of the window and at the front yard of house across the street, as if she can still see Karen out there. “It was hard on her. I mean, you know. It always is, but she was still so smitten with Ray. And she didn't see it coming, his... When he took his own life.” 

Sam clears his throat, to capture her attention before he speaks, and she turns. “Did Karen mention anything out of the ordinary? Before Janie was taken? Maybe she met someone? Or saw something strange? Anything can be important.” 

Joyce has her hands folded in her lap, kneads one with the other. “Karen had, hmm. Visions or something. Waking dreams of bad things happening to Janie. About two weeks ago, she saw Janie on the kitchen floor with slit wrists, and after that it kept happening. Sometimes she’d talked about vultures in her yard, too. I thought it had something to do with the way she lost Ray. But...” 

She trails off, and it's Dean who nudges her forward, voice low and gentle. “But now you're not so sure?” 

“No. I don't know. It's probably just a coincidence, but in hindsight it almost feels like she knew something terrible would happen.” Her breath hitches, and she turns away, dabs at her eyes with her shirt-sleeve. 

 

***

 

That night, they sneak into Brown, to peruse their library and, ah, borrow some books. After few hours of poring over books on mythology in the Middle East, Sam finds some throwaway lines about the _Bin Al Mawte_ in a tome collecting legends from ancient Persia. It’s not a perfect fit for their case, but they've worked with less. 

He stands with the open book in his hands, swats at Dean to get his attention. “Hey. Get this. The Bin Al Mawte preys on the grieving. Legend has it that they were the three daughters of a cruel king and after he was overthrown, imprisoned and killed in a gruesome execution; they swore to avenge him. They committed suicide in a ritual, and ever since then, they haunt people who recently lost loved ones. Some victims are plagued with visions of their remaining family dying and then killed in an attack, claiming the souls to honor their dead father. Others they'll take back to their cave to taunt and kill them in a way similar to what their father suffered, and sometimes they do both. Sound familiar?”

“Definitely fits what happened to Karen and her daughter. Fucked up, if you ask me, though. Prey on the grieving, that's cruel.” 

“You tell me.” 

“Anything about killin' them?” 

“No. But it says here that the three daughters were bound to a figurine and that they can be released or entrapped by reading the incantation on it. There's a drawing.” Sam tilts the book so Dean can see it, points to the scribble of a bird, a vulture or something similar, with its wings spread wide. 

Dean takes the book, creases his eyebrows. “Okay, so if we can find that statue, we can _entrap_ them again and the spook's over?” 

“In theory, yeah. You've looked at all the crime scene photos, right? Anything that fit the bill?” 

“Nah. Guess we'll have to go back to the house, have a look around,” Dean says, but he trails off when his phone starts ringing. The conversation is short and when it's over, he claps the book shut and gets up. “We gotta get goin'. Someone else went missing.” 

The new victim is a woman in her seventies. Her place in North Smithfield is swarming with police when they get there. A local detective leads them through the hallway and into an old-fashioned living room. It's overflowing with trinkets and cheap, plastic decorations, but there's no disarray; no clue that someone got taken here. “Victim's name was Betty Wilshire. No witnesses to the disappearance, just like in Providence. But she lived here with her husband, who died four months ago. That's how we connected the cases, and why we called you guys.”

Dean raises his eyebrows at Sam, briefly, so that no one else notices the gesture. “How'd he die?” 

“Liver disease. He passed in the hospital, after weeks of treatment. They had an adult daughter, she lives in Portland and is on her way here now.” 

“Okay. Mind if we have a look around?” 

“Not at all. Go ahead.” 

They don't need to talk about it; Sam knows that Dean wants to look for the statue. They scour the whole house, make their way through a lot of kitsch and clutter, but find nothing that looks remotely old or expensive. After they leave the fresh crime scene, they drive back over to Karen's house and search there, with the same result: no trace of the figurine or anything even vaguely similar. 

 

***

 

The interview with Mrs. Wilshire's daughter the next day doesn't give them anything new. It's basically a reprise of their conversation with Karen's neighbor; visions in which her remaining loved ones were dying and vultures turning up where they don't belong. 

Sam's all but sure that they're on the right track with this one, found the creature – or sisterhood of creatures, in this case – that did this. But it all hinges on the statue, and they have no damn clue where it is. 

Dean gets them each cold one out of the fridge in their room, bumps one of them against Sam shoulder, and Sam turns to take it. “It's gotta be somewhere in the area, right? Three deaths within a few miles of Providence. That can't be a coincidence.”

“Yeah,” Dean says and lets himself fall down onto his bed. He eyes his own bottle, but sets it down on the bedside table. “And we haven't found a single connection between them, except for their grief. There's no pattern. No hit list. No one picking victims.” 

“The sisters seek out those who fit their needs and go for it.” 

“Exactly. So I was thinking, maybe the statue doesn't have to be near the victims? Like, they won't have to own it or touch it or something. All they have to do is be in the same area.” 

Sam sighs, holds his beer against his temple. There may or may not be a headache in his near future. “That's not gonna make our job any easier. The fucking thing could be _anywhere_.” 

Dean finally does reach for his bottle, sits up straighter. He has that vaguely pleased look on his face that he gets sometimes when he's the one doing the explaining and Sam's the one who's listening. It's not that rare a thing between them, they both know how to do their job, but sometimes Dean seems to get a kick out of it. “Think, Sammy. Karen's visions started two weeks ago, and she and her daughter were the first to die. So, I guess we can assume it started with her?” 

That sounds plausible enough, so Sam nods. 

“And we know the cause is a rare, ancient artifact from the Middle East that comes with deadly set of vengeful... Well, whatever they are. No source we know has ever encountered anything like it. So what if that's because it's not been in the States until now? If it's been lying around in the desert, or wherever, and got shipped over here recently? There's gotta be records, right? For taxes or something?”

He's right. There's still the possibility that the figurine got brought in illegally, in which case this would be useless, but they should be able to find records about any imports that are subject to customs or tax. Sam doesn't answer, he just nods, and powers up his laptop. An hour of searching and hacking later, they're equipped with a list of local businesses that shipped in items from the Middle East within the last month. 

 

***

 

It's late afternoon when they step into a small, piled shop for oriental rugs downtown. It received a shipment from Morocco two weeks and four days ago, which put it on Sam's list. 

The shop is empty except for a boy behind the counter. He looks to be in his late teens or early twenties, scrawny and with glasses on, and he's so absorbed in a medical textbook that he doesn't notice them until Dean stands in front of him and clears his throat. “Hey. Got a minute?” 

The kid jumps, shoving the book under the counter. “Oh. Yeah, sure. Sorry. How can I help you?”

“Agents Ward and Osbourne. We're investigating two murders and an abduction in town, and there's a statue that might be related to the case. It was shipped in about two weeks ago,” Sam says, holding up his fake badge. He produces a copy of the drawing in the book they found and lays it onto the counter. “Seen anything like it?” 

Adjusting his glasses with one hand, the boy picks the copy up with the other, studies it, and nods. “Yeah. I sold it myself, last week. Does, uh, the buyer have something to do with the murders?” 

“That remains to be seen. Did he pay in cash? Or do you have credit card data or a delivery address?” 

“Yeah, I think so,” the kid says, his eyes flickering to a camera that's installed to his left and likely covers the counter and most of the shop. “But I will need to see a warrant.” 

Dean steps forward, fixes him with a glare. “Two women are dead. Mom and daughter, nice people. Another one's missing, an old lady with a daughter that's worried sick about her. You'd really help us out if you'd just _tell us_ who bought the damn statue.” 

“And I will. Once you come back with a warrant.” 

Sam can feel his brother go tense at that reply, and he puts a hand onto Dean's shoulder before his brother can enforce the request. The memories of Dean going berserk on the guy that stole the tablet a few weeks ago is still fresh in Sam's mind, and the last thing they need is a reprise of that in full sight of a surveillance camera. 

“We’ll come back,” he says, and takes the copy back to scribble his current phone number on the back. “In the meantime, if you change your mind or remember anything else that might help us, call me.” 

Dean turns and stomps out of the shop, and Sam throws the kid what he hopes is a trustworthy and encouraging smile before he follows. 

 

***

 

When he steers the Impala into the motel parking lot, Dean's still muttering about “the nerve of that guy”. 

“Maybe we don't need him,” Sam says in an attempt to calm him down. “I'll see if I can get into their computer system, and if that doesn't work out, we'll go in tonight and get the data the old-fashioned way.” 

Dean narrows his eyes at him for a moment, and then shrugs. “Whatever. Listen, while you go get your geek on, I'm gonna drive by the police station again. See if they found out anything new about Mrs. Wilshire.” 

It takes Sam a moment to realize that Dean meant that as his cue to get out of the car. “Okay, yeah. Grab something for dinner on the way back?” 

Dean nods, and Sam gets out of the car. Leaving Dean in charge of picking their food rarely ever turns out in Sam's favor, but at least it'll keep Dean busy for a little while longer; he'd rather deal with another round of greasy fast food than with an antsy, bored brother. 

Once in the room, he immediately sheds his jacket and tie and fires up the laptop. The website of the shop is easy to sneak his way into, but an outdated online shop is all he finds; no access to any data regarding customers or purchases to be gained this way. 

This probably means they'll have work to do tonight. Sam could've done without that, but the three sisters are burning through at least one victim a week. The longer this case takes them to solve, the higher the risk that someone else dies. 

Sam might not be keen on doing this job for much longer, but as long as he still does it, he'll do it right. 

He decides to grab a quick shower while Dean's out, turns it up hot and takes his time; the tiny, windowless bathroom is engulfed in steam by the time he's done. He wipes a stripe down the mirror, comes to the conclusion that it's not time for a shave yet, and pulls on boxers and a t-shirt before he steps out of the room – 

Sam freezes. His brother sits on his bed, one hand pressed to his stomach, eyes downcast, and Sam takes a second to wonder when Dean came back. He doesn't look up – doesn't seem to see Sam – until Sam says his name, but when he does, his eyes are wild and panicked. He breathes heavily, as if it hurts him to do so. 

“Sammy,” is all he says, and his voice sounds thin and strained. 

That's when Sam notices the blood. It drips down the hand Dean holds to his middle, invisible on the black fabric of the suit but a neon sign in contrast to skin. He sinks down to his knees next to the bed in a flash. “What happened? Dean. Let me see.” 

In lieu of an answer, Dean takes away his hands. The dress shirt underneath the jacket is soaked in blood, bright red for more than a hand's width in diameter, and it's ripped, revealing a deep cut to Dean's upper abdomen. When Sam looks back up to his brother's face, there's blood running down his chin, too. Dean gags on it, puts the hand that he held over the wound to his mouth to wipe it away, but all he does is smear the blood already on it all over his face. 

Cold fear crawls up Sam's spine, immobilizes him. He kneels there on the ground, with Dean staring back at him, wordlessly begging him to help him, _fix this_ , and Sam can't move a fucking muscle. He feels his chest contract, making it near impossible to draw in breath. His heartbeat speeds up so much that it hurts, every single pump of his heart a kick to his ribs. 

He knows that feeling, is more closely familiar with it than he'd like. 

The lock of the door clicks, and Sam's heart almost stops. Whoever or whatever hurt Dean is here to finish the job, no doubt, and Sam's not sure he gives a damn. At least he won't have to go through this again, make it through the loss and the grief a third time – fourth, or more, if he counts Broward County. They'll go out together. Maybe it's better this way. 

But the person who enters the room isn't just anyone. It's Dean, with a nondescript take-out bag in one hand and the car keys dangling from the other, alive and healthy and very much not looking like he's about to bleed out. Sam's throat closes up completely for a second before he remembers how to breathe; he looks from the door to the bed, and it's empty. There's no one there. He checks his hands, which were stained with Dean's blood just moments ago, but they're clean too. When he looks back to the Dean who's now standing by the table next to the door and unpacking their food – the real Dean, or so Sam hopes – his shock and confusion must show on his face, because Dean's eyes widen with worry. 

“Sam? You okay?”

Sam sinks back, leans his body against the foot of the bed. “I... Yeah. Thought I saw you, and you were hurt, but, uh. Apparently, you're not.” 

“You _thought_ you saw me?” Dean's eyebrows knit together. “Like Karen thought she saw her daughter?” 

And of course, yeah. The case. Now that Sam can think more clearly with every deep breath he takes, it's obvious. Not a random panic attack. It's the three sisters, and he's being circled. 

Dean walks over, sits down on the ground next to Sam. “Hey. We're already on it. Half the work's done, we just need to find out who bought the damn statue, read out the inscription, and bam, case closed. You'll be okay.” 

Whether or not Dean looks like he buys his own words is debatable, but he does his best, complete with reassuring smile and a squeeze to Sam's forearm. 

Sam wants to believe him, fall back onto the cushion of big-brother-fixes-it-all. It'd be easy and comfortable and familiar, and to Dean's credit, saving Sam is what Dean's good at. It's saving himself that he keeps failing with. “Yeah. We got it covered.” 

“That's the spirit,” Dean says, pats Sam's shoulder. “But, Sam?”

“Hm?”

“Who're you grieving for? Bobby? Cas?” Dean's face flickers with an emotion Sam can't quite identify when he says the angel's name, but he reigns himself in quickly, lips curling up into a half-hearted grin. “No, wait. Did your dog die?” 

Sam searches his face, takes enough time to answer for Dean to get twitchy, remind Sam of the question with an elbow to his side. But Dean really doesn't seem to get it. “Who do you _think?_ ” 

It takes another moment for the penny to drop, during which Dean stares back at Sam in bewilderment. The expression only deepens when he understands. “I wasn't dead.” 

“I didn't know that.” 

“Yeah, because you didn't care to look.” 

“Dean –“ 

“Besides, ” Dean cuts in, “in case it slipped your attention, I happen to be back now. Alive and kickin'.” He gets up, rubs his hands on his jeans. 

Sam follows his example, pushes himself to his feet as well. “Doesn't seem to matter to the three sisters. Grief for a loved one is grief for a loved one, regardless of the specifics.” 

Dean shrugs his shoulders. “Guess so. Any luck with hacking that shop?” 

The sudden change in topic throws Sam for a loop. “Hm? Ah, no. I can't access the files online.” 

“Alright, so we'll take another trip down there tonight,” Dean says. He loosens his tie and heads for the bathroom. His voice is faraway and more muffled by the door he left ajar when he continues. “We'll need to disable their camera, but other than that, I didn't see any heavy security.”

Sam only half listens while Dean babbles on, plans out their little heist and bitches about the local police's shortcomings in regards to the missing old lady. He still feels like he was going to drown, like he'd just made his way back from under the surface of an ice-cold lake. Dean's voice helps with that, though, an unmistakable reminder that Dean's back and here with him. He's not gone, he's not dead, and he's not _going_ to die anytime soon. Not again. Or, at the very least, not while Sam's around to watch him do it. 

The ringtone of his cellphone saves him from that train of thought, and it takes Sam's brain a second to shift gears and pat himself down to get it and answer the call. “Yeah?” 

“Uhm.” The voice on the other end of the line sounds hushed and uncertain, and Sam can't help but think off a teenager sneaking out of the house to call the girl he's not supposed to date. “My name's Sahir. You were at my dad's shop earlier, about that vulture statue.” 

Now, that's an unexpected call. “I'm listening.” 

Sam hears the kid take a breath. “Earlier, I brushed you off because my dad's not big on the feds. Always afraid they find something to shut him down, you know? He always tells me to insist on warrants and court orders to back things up if anyone comes by to sniff around, and he's got the camera, I didn't want to get into trouble with him. But I looked the case you talked about up in the papers. My sister went to school with Janie Radford, I met her once or twice. Everyone was so shocked about what her dad did, and now she and her mom... I want to help.” 

“Okay. Can you get the address of the buyer?” 

“Already have it.”

 

***

 

They don't talk much on the drive to Lincoln, where the statue's supposed to be now. It's only a twenty-minute drive, give or take, and Sam spends most of it silently hoping that the new owner didn't buy it as a gift and send it off to fuck-knows-where. 

Dean keeps sending over worried side-glances, but looks away as soon as Sam meets his eyes and quirks his eyebrows. He actually looks put off – as if Sam broke some kind of silent code by acknowledging the glances _and_ returning them – and turns the volume of the radio up. 

And hey, if Dean wants to pretend? He can go for it. Sam sinks down deeper in his seat, searching for a halfway comfortable position, leans his head against the window and feigns sleep. His eyes close of their own accord after maybe a minute or two, and Sam doesn't realize he really drifted off until he's abruptly awoken by a lurch of the car and the screech of metal. 

He's wide-awake in an instant. Somewhere in the back of his head there's a voice that tries to pull him back, remind him that this isn't happening, that this is fake, nothing more than the three sisters playing with his mind, but it goes ignored. 

The sight of Dean – slumped over the steering wheel and with blood running down his temple – is too powerful for logic to reach through. Sam looks around, trying to figure out what happened, and sees that they veered of the road and head-on into a tree. He leans over, pats Dean down, and finds no other visible injuries than the one on his forehead. 

But that doesn't mean much. Dean's not conscious, and he's barely breathing, so there must be _something_ else wrong with him. His pulse is racing, way too fast and out of rhythm, and Sam can't calm down enough to decide whether it'd be a good or spectacularly bad idea to get him out of the car. 

That's when Dean comes awake with a start, heaves in a desperate gulp of air – 

– and asks Sam if he could please get a tape out of the glove box, because damn, the radio stations out here suck, right? 

It's too much. More than Sam can take. The few bites of Chicken Lo Mien he choked down back in the motel, before they got going, threaten to make a reappearance, and his vision starts to swim. “Stop the car.” 

Dean looks over, eyebrows raised in confusion. “What?” 

“Stop the fucking car, or I'll puke all over your upholstery. Stop!” 

As soon as Dean's steered the Impala onto the grass verge, Sam stumbles out of the car and gets violently sick. His stomach keeps cramping and contracting long after it good rid of the food and a good deal of bile that burns up and down Sam's throat, and he feels tears running down his face from the effort. 

Dean's hand on his back, gentle but firm, is the only thing that keeps him from sinking to his knees right beside the mess and closing his eyes to the world. 

This is exactly why he wants – _needs_ – to get away from all this. It may not be real this time, and it might not even have been real a year ago when Dean went to Purgatory, but some day it will be. Some day, maybe soon, Dean's going to be dead for good. Gone. Forever. And Sam will be alone and he'll lose the ground underneath his feet once more and he won't come back from that. 

Unless he gets away first. Creates some distance. If Dean wants to get killed doing this job? That's his decision. Doesn't mean Sam has to hang around and watch him do it. 

“Hey, you okay? Sammy? Talk to me, you're freaking me out.” 

_Likewise_ , Sam wants to say, but he bites down on it. “Yeah, just, you were... Never mind. It's not real, I'll deal with it.” 

Dean doesn't buy that, it's written all over his face in blinking neon letters, but he gives Sam's back a final pat and withdraws his hand. “Then let's go snatch the damn statue and put an end to this, huh?” 

After a few deep breaths, Sam's the first to make a run back to the car, but Dean calls him back. He points to a weathered maple on the other end of the meadow they found themselves in, and Sam's eyes follow the gesture to see that the entire treetop is swarming with vultures. At least ten of them sit up there, flapping their wings, and a few more circle in the air above it. 

For the third time that day, Sam's blood runs cold. 

 

***

 

Luck's on their side for once. The buyer's house is remote and easily accessible, and she doesn't seem to be home. She put the statue up in a vitrine, but it isn't locked or otherwise secured. They're in and out in less than ten minutes. 

As soon as they're back in Providence, they realize there's another hurdle to clear. They have the statue, and there's some writing its back that ought to be the incantation, but neither of them can read it. The professor from Brown is out to call on for help – he still hasn't gotten back to them about the photos they left with him – but there's someone else they can ask for a translation: Sahir. 

Dean's the one to point that out. 

“No way,” Sam replies. “We're not gonna drag him into this.” 

“Oh, so you'd rather sit here, twiddling your thumbs while you wait for the three sisters to grab you? Wasn't aware you're harboring a death wish, Sammy.” 

And isn't that rich, coming from Dean. “I don't. But what are we going to tell him?”

“The usual bullshit,” Dean says. He's been sitting by the window since they got back, alternately scowling at the statue and staring out the window, but now he turns and sends a glare in Sam's direction. “We need it for the case, some psycho uses that legend to justify his blood lust, whatever. Don't play dumb, man. We'll think of something.” 

“We don't even know if he can read Arabic. Just because he's Syrian doesn't mean –” 

“That one can be cleared quickly, just pick up the damn phone and _call_ the kid!” Dean closes his eyes, takes a breath. “Dammit, Sam. Quit being so pig-headed and let me help you.” 

There's something in Dean's tone that makes Sam fold. He's worried – of course he is, Sam'd be frantic if their positions were reversed – but that's not all there is. Dean sounds weary and pissed off at the same time, desperation barely veiled by a thin layer of anger and frustration. Ever since Purgatory, Dean's emotions somehow run higher, both positive and negative. Sam would call that a good thing, except for how he can't shake the feeling that Dean's not simply more open; he's laid bare. He's got no control over it, and right now Sam worries that he'll snap, soon, if they don't solve this one quickly. 

“Okay,” he relents. “Fine, I'll call him.” 

Dean just nods and rubs a hand down his face, watches Sam silently as he gets his phone out and scrolls to Sahir's number in the caller history. 

It takes several rings, but eventually Sahir picks up. “Yeah?” 

“Agent Ward here. We need your help with something else.” 

“Oh, uhm. Wait a second.” There's the sound of footsteps on a wooden floor, then a door opening and closing. “Okay. What is it?” 

“Do you speak Arabic? Can you read it? We have a text here that needs translating.” 

“Ah, some? Like, I can read it and keep up basic small talk, but that's about it.” 

“That should be enough. Can you us meet somewhere?”

Sahir exhales, and for a moment Sam thinks he might back out. Sam'd understand; he knows how difficult it can be to follow your own instincts when your family tells you to do the exact opposite. But that's not what happens. “Alright, yeah, okay. I'm at home now, with my folks, but I was gonna go to a party on campus later. We can meet up instead. Hour and a half, on Ship Street Square?” 

Sam agrees, and they hang up. “An hour and a half, and he gave us an address that I think is the Brown's Med Building“ he says, addressing Dean. 

“Med student, hm? He had the book when we saw him at the shop.” 

“Yeah, guess so.” Dean's right, it'd make sense for the kid to choose familiar ground for a meeting he's nervous about. But he doesn't want to linger on Sahir's career choices, the details of life they're going to ruin if this goes haywire. Plus, the last med student who fell into the Winchester grinder and came out the other end in pieces was their half-brother. Sam still feels something sharp and icy run down his spine whenever he thinks of him. 

Dean frowns. “What do you have in mind? You know, for when you _quit_ ” – Dean spits that word out as if it's poisonous and rank on his tongue – “and stroll back to college. Law again?” 

And yeah, so that's why Dean steered the conversation in that direction. Sam probably should've seen it coming, but in his defense, he's had kind of a bad day. “Dean, I told you. Haven't decided anything yet. I'm just looking into some options.” 

“How's that even work? We both hit the Most Wanted list more than once, died a couple of times, some of which are on public record. If you do score yourself a degree, it can't be under your real name.” 

Sam can't decide if Dean's really concerned about that, or just scrabbling for ways to shoot holes in Sam's plans. Knowing him, it's probably both. “That's my problem, okay?” 

The look Dean shoots him in response is another one of those things that are new about him, or that Sam forgot how to interpret. His frown deepens, but it's more resignation with a hint of confusion than anger now. “Yeah. It's gonna be.” 

 

***

 

When they arrive at the Plaza, Sahir's already there. He's standing by a side-entrance to the building, arms crossed over his chest and half-hidden in the meager shadow of one of the tall, narrow trees that are planted in a row all along its front. It's dark out, past 10 PM by now. 

They shake hands, and Sam pulls out a flashlight together with the statue. Not ideal, but he's not quite up for dragging Sahir back to their motel room and having to explain why to alleged FBI agents stay in a dump at the edge of town and live out of duffel bags. 

Sahir squints at the carved letters. “This is, well. Yeah. I think I can translate it. Should I tell you what it says, or...?” 

“Yeah,” Sam says. “And it'd be great if you'd also write down in its original wording. A phonetic transcript or something?” 

Seems like Sahir's starting to wonder what the hell the FBI would ever need that for and why they'd need a college kid to do the job for them instead of simply turning to their own labs and assets; he looks from Sam to Dean and back with raised eyebrows. But then he seems to decide that's none of his business, shrugs, and turns his attention back to the statue. “It says that the, uh, daughters of death are to be imprisoned by reading aloud the three lines at the end.” He points at three lines of words that are inclined a little, underneath the rest of the inscription. “They must all be present in order to be taken in; if one escapes, she will be able to call her sisters back immediately. The best way to do that is by catching them when they feed, or when they rest in their house of stones, for otherwise they'll be roaming around.” 

Sahir holds the statue back out to Sam, who signals him to keep it for a moment longer. “Those three lines at the end, can you read them out loud? In Arabic? Write them down, too, so we can recite them later?” 

The decision Sahir made a few moments ago, about whether or not he wants to know what exactly is going on here, seems to waver. He glances down at the statue, and back up at Sam. “Seriously, guys. What's going on here? Is the FBI investigating some weird old Arabian folk tale now? Am I on camera?” 

Dean – who has been silently standing half a step behind Sam until now – is the one who answers that. Sam guesses he kept out of the conversation because of impression he must've made on the kid when they first met in the shop, but now he's using that to their advantage: His voice is a carefully calculated mix of authoritative and irritated, when he addresses Sahir. “No. _Of course_ not. But the nutjob who's killing those women thinks the damn critters are real, so we're going to play along if we have to. Everything necessary to get his latest victim back will be done, even if that means reciting some bullshit from an ugly ancient bird statue.” 

It doesn't miss the mark. Sahir shrinks back a little. “Yeah, okay. Sorry. Of course.” He reads the text, eyes flying nervously up to Dean every few words, and Sam feels a little sorry for him. 

Sam takes the statue back when he's done, alongside with a quick note Sahir scribbles on a sheet of paper held to the wall of the building they're standing in front of. Afterwards, the kid excuses himself with a hushed goodbye. 

Dean's eyes follow him with a smug, self-satisfied grin on his lips, and Sam's not quite sure if he wants to give him a shove to the ribs or send a quick thank you to whoever might still be listening that this, finally, is a version of his brother he knows and recognizes. He doesn't do either, passes both the statue and the note to Dean and starts for the car. 

 

***

 

The wait until the three sisters make their appearances is horrible. Sam has another hallucination on their way back to the motel – them getting attacked from behind on their way to the motel room, which ends up with their attacker slitting Dean's throat and shoving him at Sam – and wakes up to a cold and reeking corpse instead of his brother the next morning.

That one almost costs him his sanity, but it's the last one for a while. The rests of the day goes by without incident, and as the sun sets behind the cheap, dingy curtains of their room Sam wonders how long it'll take for the fucking creatures to show. How long they're going to torture him like this, let him simmer on low heat until they decide he's ripe for the taking. 

Dean spends most of the day buried in the books they stole from the library, trying in vain to find another mention of the three sisters, while Sam does nothing else than wait. He's numb, exhausted, afraid that every time he looks at Dean he'll see something dead or dying instead, and so he doesn't. He thinks of last summer, a world that didn't make sense, an injured dog and two people who connected through nothing more than their pain. He's not sure he misses Amelia, or if he's just longing for something she represented in hindsight: peace, safety, the absence of fear. Not having to worry every day if the person you're used to sharing your life with will still be breathing by nightfall. 

He's almost grateful when he feels a pull in his chest, his heart beating faster in a way that's not the least bit natural. “Dean.” 

Dean's head whips around. “I'm here, I'm alive, I'm okay. It's just a hallucination, Sammy.” 

“No, no. They're coming. I can feel them.” 

“Fuck,” Dean says, pats himself down for the note with the incantation that he pocketed the other night. He fishes it out of his back pocket the same moment that three female figures materialize in front of them. They look mostly human, if a little pale, and wear wide white robes that barely touch the ground: they're not walking, they're hovering. There's a low whisper, words Sam doesn't understand. One of them approaches him, hisses, and that's when Dean starts the recitation. 

The sister that was headed for Sam shrieks, turns abruptly, and rips the piece of paper from Dean's hand. It rains down to the ground in shreds, and before Sam can react or wrap his head around what's happening the other two follow her leap. Each of them takes Dean by the arm, and the last thing Sam sees before they all disappear together is the wide-eyed, startled look on his brother's face as they take him away. 

 

***

 

Sam's call to Sahir is more desperation that strategy. He needs the incantation again, so it probably does make some kind of sense, but Sam's also sure he won't make it through this without another person being by his side. If he'd try to make it through this all alone, it'd be too much like last year; Dean there one second, gone the next, and Sam doesn't know where to start. His thoughts are a jumbled mess, he can't _think_ , and the fifteen minutes it takes Sahir to show up on the doorstep of the motel room seem endless. He makes a quick thing out of the explanations that he needs to give; no, they're not FBI agents. Yes, they really are hunting mystical creatures from an old, Arab legend, and no, Sam hasn't seen a therapist lately. 

“My brother's gone,” he finishes, and he doesn't care if it sounds like begging. “You're the only one who can help me get him back, right now. I don't care if you think I'm nuts, but please, please, don't back out now.” 

The kid's eyes search Sam's face in open scrutiny. “I don't know, man. That all sounds pretty wacky.” 

“I know it does. It's hard to believe, but it's the truth. And he's going to die if I don't find him. _Please._ ” 

Sahir's eyebrows knit together, he scratches at his temple. “Okay, alright. Show me the statue again, yeah?”

Sam does, and picks the book that contains the legend of the three sisters out of the pile on Dean's bed while Sahir studies the inscription again. He reads the three or four paragraphs once, twice, and all of a sudden something springs out at him. “The inscription talks about _their house of stone_ or something, right?” 

“Yeah, as the place where they rest. Why?” 

“Are there any caves in the area? Stone quarries, anything?” 

“Uhm.” Sahir digs out his cell phone, pinches in a few letters. “The only thing I know that'd qualify as cave would be Purgatory Chasm.”

Sam's sure he misheard. “Purgatory _what_?” 

“It's a state reservation in Sutton, not far beyond the border, in Massachusetts,” Sahir says and holds the phone out to Sam. The screen shows a tall rock formation. “The Chasm was created during the last ice age. My grandpa loved it, and I went there with my grandparents a few times when I was a kid. Creepy, but impressive. There are some caves, too. Not very big, but enough to hide a body or two, I suppose.” 

In the interest of his own mental health, Sam chooses to ignores Sahir's use of the word _body_. He hands the phone back. “Do you know how to get there?” 

 

***

 

The Chasm looks like a relict from another time. Huge, ripped stone formations shoot up on either side of a ravine, only barely overgrown with trees and small shrubs. There's no grass on the ground, and even the smallest stones that lie scattered on the ground in front of the Chasm are almost a man's height. It really is impressive, although Sam can't spare any thoughts to marvel at the beauty of it; he still has no idea where exactly Dean might be.

All in all, the Chasm is a quarter of a mile long. That's not small, but not impossible to search through either. Most of the caves and gaps aren't big enough to fit a human being in there, and in the third one they check, they find evidence that they're in the right place, at least: Mrs. Wilshire's body lies in one of them. She's barely recognizable, her face a swollen mess of bruises and broken bones, her clothes cut down to rags and bathed in blood. 

After that, Sahir goes quiet. So does Sam, truth to be told; until now he'd managed to put the fact that the three sisters are known to torture the victims they take back to their cave out of his mind, but the sight of the old lady brought it back with a vengeance. 

The whispers and hisses of the sisters is what gets them on the right track in the end, sounding from a cave with an elevated mouth. Sam has to climb a few rocks to get a good look inside: it's narrow but long, and just high enough for a him to stand. He can't see Dean, but he can _hear_ him, his groans and labored breathing echoing from the stone walls, and makes the hard decision to take care of the creatures before he'll go in and rescue his brother. The sisters stand closer to the mouth than were Dean is, and there's no way for Sam to get past them without getting noticed. 

He climbs back down to get the statue and make sure Sahir knows what he's got to do. The kid looks pale and a little green around the gills. “Hey, you with me.” 

“Huh? Ah, yeah. You found him?” 

“I did. And I need you to stay right here where you are, and keep the incantation ready, okay? When I tell you to, you gotta start reading it out.” 

Sahir nods and holds up a slip of paper that he wrote the text on. “Got it. I'll be here. I'm ready.” 

Unless he passes out first, Sam thinks sourly, but he can't worry about that now. He's gotta be fast, get in and bring the statue near the sisters before they have a chance to react and kill either him or Dean. 

But when he climbs the few feet back up to the mouth of the cave, he's eerily calm. This is the kind of stress and adrenaline he's used to, that he's known all his life; he slips into the cave silently, close to the wall, and shouts the go-ahead at Sahir the exact moment the first sister registers his presence. The boy's voice is muted but clear, and the creatures react immediately. They hiss and squeal, advance at Sam, who they must suspect to be the one who's saying the incantation, but they don't reach him before the old words can take effect. 

It looks a little bit like a scene from Aladdin, one of the few Disney movies Sam saw as a kid; the three sisters screech and wail, dissolve into dust, and get sucked into the statue in a swirl of air. 

Dean lies propped up against the wall at the far side of the cave. He stares at the space where the three sisters used to be seconds ago, at Sam, back, and then runs the back of his hand across is forehead. Sam can't stop thinking about the reports he read, the state Janie was found in, what she must've been through before she died. But they had her far longer than they had Dean, and Dean appears to be mostly in one piece. There's a long slash in his t-shirt along the left side of his torso and a few more, less serious cuts all over his body, his face is swollen in places and he's got a black eye, but other than that, he seems fine. 

The statue still vibrates on the ground, gives off a faint crackle like it's readjusting itself to the power once again contained in it, but Sam couldn't care less right now. He leaves it on the ground, and runs over to his brother, takes his chin in one hand and turns Dean's face this way and that. Dean doesn't resist, and doesn't react much when Sam pats him down, until he reaches the area near the wound on his side. 

His eyes fly open, zoom in on Sam, and he yelps. “You sadistic little fuck. Quit pokin' at that, can't do anything about it out here anyway.” 

Sam could explode with relief. “Hey, gotta wake you somehow. Can you get up?” 

“Yeah, I think,” Dean says, swats at Sam's hands until he lets him go, and unfolds himself to a stand with the help of the cave wall behind him instead. He sways precariously once he's gotten his feet underneath him, closes his eyes and takes in a breath, and when he opens them again, it's like he's put on armor. His face still scrunches up in pain with every step forward he takes, but otherwise his expression is blank and his steps are steady and sure. “Let's get outta here.” 

They do just that, and Sam collects the statue on their way out. Sahir is still standing by the opening of the cave, gripping the incantation text so hard that his knuckles are white with it. 

Sam bites down on a laugh. Freaked-out as he may be, the kid did okay. “You can let go of that now, man.” 

Sahir doesn't reply, balls the paper up and stuffs it into his pant pocket. They drop him off at home, but Sam keeps the goodbye quick; Dean's wound needs his attention, and they both could use some sleep. 

 

***

 

Dean's awake and already packing by the time Sam wakes up the next morning. “Hey, sleepy-head. Get going, I wanna be out of here sooner rather than later.” He points at the statue that's lying on the fornica table by the window, now wrapped in an old newspaper and hidden in a plastic bag. “Put this into storage and look for our next gig.” 

There's a number of good reasons why they shouldn't, not least of all the freshly stitched slash in Dean's side, but Sam understands his eagerness to get out of here. It's never been Dean's style to linger around after a hunt unless either of them is hurt so badly the other has to put him on bed rest, and he's even more restless and fidgety since he came back. Dean radiates the need to keep moving, and the risk of a pulled suture won't be enough to hold him in place for long. 

An hour later, they're checked out and on the road. Sam's driving, and the fact that Dean didn't protest that tells him all he needs to know about how his brother's feeling. He waits until they're well out of town to see if the familiar hum of the car, eating up mile after mile on a highway, will lull Dean to sleep. It doesn't. He's turned towards the window, but Sam knows his breathing patterns well enough to sense whether he's awake or asleep. 

“Hey, Dean?” 

“Hmm?” 

“Can I ask you something?” 

Dean gives an annoyed groan. “Can I stop you?” 

“Who was it for you? Cas? What happened down there? They wouldn't have taken you if you weren't grieving for someone as well.” 

“You just don't know when to leave well enough alone, do you?” Dean turns slowly in the seat, one hand pressed to his side, and glares at Sam, more exhausted than pissed. “I'm not gonna talk about it, so how 'bout you trust me when I tell you he's gone and shut up?” 

It's not like Sam expected a straight answer, and he could try remind Dean that Cas was his friend too and that he deserves to know, but assumes all that'd get him is another dig at the year he spent not-looking for either of them. 

He turns his gaze back to the road ahead. 

 

 

 

 **A/N:**  
In my newly established tradition of using Interesting Places That Really Exist: [Purgatory Chasm](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purgatory_Chasm_State_Reservation) is a real place, and it didn't come up until the later stages of plotting and writing this fic, when a friend helped me look for caves in the area. Meant to happen, y/y? XD


End file.
